Parallel Arrows
by Dragonsscribe
Summary: "Hawkeye and Green Arrow sitting in a tree. S-N-I-P-I-N-G." Challenge Wars prompt-fill. Clint and Oliver are sniping baddies from a tree after an inter-dimensional portal throws the Avengers into a parallel universe.


Thunt!

The arrow buried itself in the chest of one of Hydra's goons, sending the man flopping back to the ground. A second arrow whizzed past the fallen human, toppling a quadrupedal creature of indeterminable species. It might have been a mix of a horse, hyena, and mucous.

The world was often inexplicable but this was growing to ridiculous standards.

He had only recently been forced under the whim of a magic hand (or staff, really), and there had been aliens. Magic and aliens. As Natasha had said, they weren't trained for this sort of thing. They weren't prepared to go against armies of creatures from other galaxies or maybe-an-actual-god with a mind control glowstick. They hadn't been allowed three months to come to terms with a change in the status quo - or to grieve, damnit, for those they had lost - and suddenly, alternate dimensions and Earths that were the same-but-different were thrown into the mix.

And here, in this world, Hawkeye - Clint Barton - didn't exist. Had never existed. As they described it, would never exist. In his place was Green Arrow, who looked and acted more like a Robin Hood wannabe than any parallel dimensional alter-ego of him.

Clint glanced curiously up at the broad-shouldered man who was crouched on a thick tree branch. Definitely a Robin Hood wannabe.

Even as he studied his supposed alternate dimensional replacement, Clint released the bowstring, allowing another arrow to fly at a target he had spotted about thirty seconds prior. Calculations raced through his mind without need for conscious thought - where had he been? how fast was he moving? what was his purpose? how were his reactions? where would he be when the arrow was released? account for windspeed. account for time of the arrow's flight. Strike true.

Thunt!

Clint fixed another arrow into his bow, eyes scanning.

Hydra had come with them when the portal between dimensions was opened. Of course they had - this whole jumping dimensions business was their fault. Clint would have been happy to stay in his own dimension, thank you very much, and never come to know that in another dimension, his admittedly-impressive skills were supposedly being duplicated by a pansy in feathered cap and tights. Clint hadn't realized that jumping through Hydra's interdimensional portal after their resident genius-idiot in metal suit would result in something reminiscent of a Mel Brooks crack-film. He was constantly waiting for the archer to start a jaunty tune.

And what was worse - all them seemed to have some form of alter-ego in this dimension, although every one of them was severely warped. The most-similar was Captain America's alter-ego, who was yet another alien. Superman - just about as original a name as the good captain's. They both had that same boy scout mentality of fairness and doing what was right and following the rules - the kind of mentality that never worked for Clint and which he wasn't jealous of at all. Of course, Captain America couldn't shoot laser beams out of his eyes, no matter how awesome the super serum had made him - one point to the freaky new dimension.

Green Arrow sent another Hydra air spinning to the ground.

Then there was Natasha's alter-ego. Oh boy. Clint could admit that he and Natasha were friends - as much of friends as two people of their professions, their backgrounds, could be. Despite that friendship, however, or perhaps because of it, Clint had a healthy respect for Natasha - her abilities, her strength… Clint was understandably frightened by her, just as he knew she was understandably frightened of him. It was a fear that came from knowledge of each others' skills, and that they knew each other better than anyone else.

That being said, Clint found Hawkgirl… daunting. Natasha didn't process emotions like a normal person. Unless she was acting out a role, and she usually was, Natasha didn't display emotions. Hawkgirl was the opposite. She was ferocity incarnate. It was such a vast alteration that it threw Clint when he first met the woman with hair a near perfect shade of red to Natasha's, and wings.

Yet another alien.

Then there was Tony's alter-ego.

Two quickly-released arrows and two more of the weird quadrupeds were down.

Clint couldn't get a full read on the black and grey-clad enigma that was Batman. A suit of armor he could understand, or at least get used to, but a grown man dressed up like a flying rodent? And he'd thought Thor was weird.

What Tony did as a genius-billionaire-playboy-philanthropist, Batman matched with equal genius, and then hid all the rest behind a mask and shroud of darkness. Of course, if Clint thought about it, that didn't seem too incredibly different from Tony, either. Clint couldn't read people as well as Natasha - not when he was working alongside them. He saw better at a distance. He always had. Even Nastasha, though, had read Tony wrong, though none of them were yet sure how wrong. It was becoming increasingly clear, though, that the Iron Man suit hid more than Tony's body. Clint wondered how much they didn't know about their resident idiot-genius.

The same idiot-genius that had decided that leaping through a Hydra-created portal was a good idea. That the rest of them had followed was a testament to their state of mind.

Thunt.

Clint fixed another arrow in his bow.

With Thor still in Asgard, whatever alter-dimensional-ego they may have met of his, Clint didn't recognize. Although, he admitted to himself with some amusement that he could see similarities between the god of thunder and the amazon princess, Wonder Woman.

Once they had begun to realize the similarities, they had all begun looking to find the team's alternates. Clint knew he wasn't the only one who had seen the similarities of Thor to Wonder Woman. He also wasn't the only one to realize that Bruce didn't have an alternate-dimensional-ego. He'd seen the moment Bruce himself had realized - the soft, sad smile that contained more understanding than the situation deserved. And then Tony's realization, not so much at Bruce's lack of a match, but his resignation to it. The sudden flare of disapproving fury - at Bruce, the circumstances, himself, Clint didn't know - before Tony had stormed off in a fit.

He thought that it may have occurred to Tony, as it had occurred to Clint, that this was the universe's way of saying that the Hulk was not meant to exist. That Bruce Banner was never meant to survive the lab accident that gave his rage physical form.

It was a disturbing thought, because Clint was really growing to like Bruce. The idea that someone, somewhere, deity, Fate, Time immemoreal or otherwise, thought that Bruce shouldn't exist…

Well, it wasn't right.

If the quadruped Clint hit flew back a little further than normal, neither he nor Green Arrow commented.

These creatures apparently weren't normal for this dimension, according to the Justice League, as they called themselves. They had only first appeared as the portal between their dimensions was opened - a byproduct of Hydra's ambitious idiocy.

Thunt.

They were easy to dispose of. Remarkably stupid creatures for something so utterly terrifying in appearance and lean in form. It appeared as though it should have been able to run quickly, that its sharp teeth were made to devour. Instead, the creatures milled around like cattle, drooling great globs of fleshy mucous in lieu of eating. Maybe if they had evolved over time. Perhaps if they had grown into their teeth and long limbs, rather than being thrown into them one maddening day.

Thunt.

Green Arrow and Clint had been sent out to keep an eye from a distance, to watch, as was Clint's way. Meanwhile, the others were dealing with Hydra, working alongside their alternate egos, as Clint was.

Clint and Green Arrow both looked up as a bright white light split the sky like a beacon.

Thunt.

Clint was impressed to see that Green Arrow hadn't even glanced away from the beacon to fire the shot. Another quadruped down. The last one, by Clint's count, as he glanced around.

"Seems your friends have done it."

"Yours, too," Clint said. He glanced up at the archer. "Justice League, right?"

"And you're the Avengers." Green Arrow held out his hand.

Clint grabbed hold of it and allowed the other man to pull him up from his position hanging upside down from the tree branch by his knees. He settled on the branch next to the Green Arrow.

The two sat for a moment and watched the beacon of light bloom and spread, a portal opening as it had once before. Clint rolled his eyes, wondering if Tony had jumped through it yet. Genius, but an idiot.

"That's my cue," he said, standing up and collapsing his bow. He jumped to the ground, followed by Green Arrow.

"Hey, nice shooting with you, Hawkeye," Green Arrow said, holding out his hand.

"You, too." He shook the archer's hand. "And it's Clint."

"Oliver. I guess I won't see you around."

"Probably not."

Though, you never knew. After all, magic, gods, aliens, parallel dimensions, and they were only scratching the surface here. What was it going to be next? Mutants?

Yeah, right.


End file.
